Chicago White Sox vs. Atlanta Braves MLB Betting Preview

With the MLB All-Star break all wrapped up, baseball now looks to the latter half of the 2023 season. In the first day back in action for the league, the MLB-leading Atlanta Braves will play host to the struggling Chicago White Sox in the first of a three-game series at Truist Park in downtown Atlanta.

Taking the mound for the juggernaut Braves will be right-hander Charlie Morton and his opponent for the White Sox will be another righty, Michael Kopech. Predictably, the Braves will enter the matchup as massive moneyline favorites on all MLB betting sites.

Chicago White Sox @ Atlanta Braves MLB Betting Odds - July 14th @ 7:20PM

The Braves have won five of the last six meetings, but considering the teams haven’t squared off in nearly half a decade, those numbers don’t mean much. Atlanta is actually coming off a rare loss here, though they’d won eight of their previous nine games before that. Conversely, the season has continued to get exponentially worse for the White Sox, who lost seven of ten games heading into the All-Star break. All odds provided by Betway.

Chicago White Sox Betting Odds

The Chicago White Sox are just 38-54 on the season, which puts them in fourth place in a pretty mediocre AL Central. Their recent struggles have also dropped them right out of the Wild Card race as well, as they currently sit 12.5 games back of the Wild Card battle.

They’ve got one of the worst batting lineups in the league as evidenced by the fact that they sit in the bottom ten in the majors in runs, RBIs, and batting average. The biggest issue for White Sox batters is a complete lack of plate discipline: they are 11th in the majors with 810 strikeouts and 29th with just 229 walks. 

With tons of strikeouts and barely any walks, they’re hitting against the tougher starting pitchers for larger portions of games, so it’s not surprising that they’re finding it hard to create offense on a consistent basis. It doesn’t help that they are putting up the second-worst OBP in the majors against right-handed pitchers at .291.

They’re barely scoring more than four runs per game, which makes it hard on pitchers even when they’re having a good night on the mound. Case in point, Monday’s starter Michael Kopech. Kopech has been on a roll lately, posting a 2.83 ERA and a 1.20 WHIP over his past 11 starts. Care to venture a guess as to how many of those starts he won? Three.

Kopech is a solid starter, but with eight runs in support over his past four starts, he doesn’t stand much of a chance against the best batting order in baseball if it continues this way. The Braves aren’t particularly good at hitting righties, because they’re simply good at hitting anything off anyone this year.

There’s a reason the White Sox are +200 odds underdogs for just the second time this season. This road matchup with the Braves is the perfect storm for the White Sox: they come in as the road underdogs, a situation in which they have gone 12-23 this year, 24th in the majors. They have also gone 8-13 against teams from the NL, and their 21-35 record against teams with a winning record is also not an encouraging sign here.

Atlanta Braves Betting Odds

Is there a better, more well-rounded, or more fun team to watch right now than the Atlanta Braves? They nudged themselves ahead of the AL’s Tampa Bay Rays for the best record in the MLB after winning eight of their final 10 games leading to the All-Star break, giving them a 60-29 record through nearly 90 games. They’re basically winning two of every three games, putting them on pace for a 100+ win season barring an epic collapse.

If you’d bet $100 on the Braves moneyline in each of their last 10 outings, they would have made you $313, so their moneyline is always a pretty safe bet. However, at -250 odds on Friday, there’s not much value there, so instead we will look to the runline.

Atlanta’s -1.5 runline is sitting at excellent and honestly surprising -115 odds, so if you’re looking for some awesome value on Friday night, the best team in the majors to beat one of the worst teams in the majors by 2+ runs is about as good as it gets.

Atlanta has been solid against quality squads this year, winning 32 of 51 games against teams with winning records. But the great teams also win the games they’re supposed to. To that end, Atlanta has gone 28-10 against teams below the .500 threshold, winning nearly 75 percent of those games. There’s nothing to think about on this one, Atlanta is 29-14 as a home favorite this year (4th in MLB), so roll with the Braves to continue asserting themselves.